Football Begin Protection

The Indianapolis Glazier Clinic was a medium sized center with a small but enthusiastic contingent of youth football coaches. It was fantastic to see men from all the method from Cincinnatti there that ran my system last year for the very first time.

I got to the center simply in time to see some excellent speakers consisting of a Special Teams guru that had sent out a number of kickers to Division I and NFL teams. I had breakfast one on one with a High School head coach from El Paso whose group set numerous Texas Passing Records. We do not go to these things with the idea we are looking for new football plays or brand-new schemes, simply better ways to achieve our goals and to see how other successful coaches and programs do things.

Kickoff Coverage

We onside kick with a mob or pooch kick until we are leading by 3 goals, then we kick deep. Our onside and pooch kick protection has actually been extremely good. Our theory is, why put the ball in the hands of the other teams finest player “in area”, when no one is holding a gun to your head to do so?

Deep Kicks

What hasn’t looked so great for us has actually been our deep kickoff coverage. We simply have not troubled to put a descent coverage plan in place and even practice covering deep kicks. Part of my absence of coaching effort in this area comes from top priorities and part originates from the fact that when we are up by 3 or more ratings and kick deep we actually don’t care if there is a descent return or not. But if part of our charge as youth football coaches is to pursue excellence in every element of the video game, our deep kick coverage needed a great deal of work.

High School Legend and His Kick Coverage Concepts

Phil Acton is a High School coach with an incredible performance history of success, particularly in the unique groups arena. His start protection group had not had a kickoff return for a goal in over 20 years and last season had simply 2 returns go past the 30 lawn line. Phil is firmly convinced the “lane theory” that the majority of kick-off protection groups utilize doesn’t make much sense. He prepared a number of returns that showed the large silliness of this principle. If the opposing team were to receive the kick on the ideal hash and the returner ran the ball directly the right hash, the kicking groups gamers on the left hash and to the left of the left hash would be squandered players if they remained in their lanes. These left hash defenders could even be left unblocked, enabling the return group to use double groups and numbers to overwhelm the protection group where the return group wished to focus its return.

Phil had a very easy concept imparted to all his kick protection gamers: keep the returner in front of and within you. If you are on the left side of the returner, you would adjust your pursuit course to insure the ball carrier was in front of but also inside your right shoulder. The protectors would continue to change their pursuit courses to insure they were not being outflanked. Now the ball provider instead of simply having to beat 2-3 players that remain in or nearby the ‘lane’ he selected to run in, he needs to beat 8-10 defenders. Phil also suggested directional kicking so his groups had to only protect a portion of rather than the entire field. He constantly wanted to kick away from the most unsafe return male and make that returner run to field the football.

Kick Coverage for Youth Football

When coaching youth football it is necessary that you comprehend the importance of unique teams. Your kick coverage group is not the one you load up all your non-starters on, that is a dish for catastrophe. Open space taking on is something most of your non-starters do not do extremely well. In my book “Winning Youth Football a Step by Step Plan” we provide you much more secure and gamer advancement friendly methods of getting those kids playing time, however it definitely isn’t on the kickoff group.

Youth Football Coaching Adjustment

In youth football it may make good sense to add a little adjustment to this method. A simple method to require the ball provider to the inside would be to place your boxing ends in positions that would require the ballcarrier to the middle of the field or even better to one side of the field, so you have less field to protect. You could also designate your best open field tacklers to the side you are forcing to. As the majority of you know, I do not like to advise anything we have not greatly field checked with a variety of teams, ages, ability and competitors, so I’m not

We onside kick with a mob or pooch kick up until we are leading by 3 touchdowns, then we kick deep. His kick off coverage team had actually not had a kickoff return for a touchdown in over 20 years and last season had just 2 returns go past the 30 yard line. If the opposing team were to receive the kick on the ideal hash and the returner ran the ball directly up the best hash, the kicking teams gamers on the left hash and to the left of the left hash would be wasted gamers if they stayed in their lanes. These left hash defenders could even be left unblocked, permitting the return group to utilize double groups and numbers to overwhelm the protection group where the return team wanted to focus its return.

Your kick coverage group is not the one you load up all your non-starters on, that is a recipe for catastrophe.

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